The term “Original Six” gets applied to the Boston Bruins, Chicago Blackhawks, Detroit Red Wings, Montreal Canadiens, New York Rangers, and Toronto Maple Leafs. Like some shmuck, I always just assumed that these were the original 6 teams in the NHL and expansion gradually brought us up to today’s 32. What a fool I was!
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The “Original Six is really just a term given to the Modern NHL teams as they began play in 1942. The NHL did not start in 1942 though, it started in 1917. Hell, the Stanley Cup dates back to 1893! It all started when the National Hockey Association folded because all of the rest of the owners hated a guy named Eddie Livingstone1 who owned two Toronto teams. The remaining franchises in Montreal (x2), Toronto, and Ottawa formed the NHL. There was a Quebec team too, but they didn’t join right away, replaced one of the Montreal teams, and then moved to Hamilton.
By 1924, the NHL finally expanded into the United States with the Boston Bruins who, along with a second (third really) Montreal team (the Maroons) joined the Montreal Canadiens, Ottawa Senators, Toronto St. Patricks, and the Hamilton Tigers. Despite this being the first time the NHL got to 6 teams, they are not considered the “Original.”
The following year, more forbidden USA fruit needed to be tasted as the New York Americans and the Pittsburgh Pirates began play. Sadly, the Hamilton Tigers ceased operations and a second team has not graced the Toronto Metropolitan area since. This brought the NHL to 7. What the hell?
Expansion didn’t end there though. Two years later, things got busy with the addition of the Chicago Black Hawks,2 Detroit Cougars (later the Falcons, later the Red Wings), and a 2nd New York team, the Rangers. They were up to 10. In 1930, the Pirates moved across the state to become the Philadelphia Quakers where they would thrive for ages and ages! One year later they were contracted and the Senators went on hiatus. Back to 8.
By 1932, Ottawa came back but unfortunately no more hockey for Philadelphia for another 35 years. They would play with 9 teams for a few years, but hockey still wasn’t doing so well in Ottawa. They moved to St. Lous to become the Eagles3 in 1934 and folded the next year. The NHL was back down to 8 for a few years then down to 7 in 1938 when the Montreal Maroons closed shop.
This left one too many for the Original Six with the New York Americans and eventually the Brooklyn Americans as the odd team out. They folded in 1942 to bring us to the Bruins, Black Hawks, Red Wings, Canadiens, Rangers, and Maple Leafs that get all the Original Six credit today. Original is simply the wrong word here. They should be called the Remaining Six or the Hanging Half Dozen. That would make more sense.
The NHL remained at six teams for 25 years! Ever wonder why Montreal, Toronto and Detroit have so many championships? Lack of competition. Back then, each team had a 1 in 6 chance of being the champs! In that time, the Canadiens won 10x, the Maple Leafs won 9x, the Red Wings won 5x, and the Black Hawks won once. We should all take solace in the fact that despite the lack of teams, Boston and New York didn’t win at all.
In 1967 though, enough was enough and the NHL doubled in size with expansion to Los Angeles, Minnesota, Oakland, Philadelphia, Pittsburgh, and St. Louis. We’ll talk about that later this year though. Until then, scoff in the general direction of the Bruins, Rangers, Red Wings, and Blackhawks because you know that their reputation as Original is all LIES!!!
- Lol, his name was “living-stone” and was hated. That’s on the nose ↩︎
- Not a typo! The team name was split into two words back then ↩︎
- GO BIRDS ↩︎
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